The Singapore National Olympic Council (SNOC) has apparently asked Singapore's best marathoner, Soh Rui Yong, to keep their dispute private and away from the public eye. Soh however, is continuing the fight against the SNOC, saying that as a public entity, SNOC should maintain high standards of accountability and transparency.

Two-time SEA Games marathon winner Mr Soh was excluded from the lineup of athletes competing in the SEA Games for this year, which is scheduled for late November-early December in Manila, Philippines. The reason cited by SNOC was that Soh “has displayed conduct that falls short of the standards of attitude and behaviour that the SNOC expects of and holds its athletes to”. Soh has since fought back publicly, after this announcement and the reason given was made public. Apart from his posts on social media debunking his alleged bad standard of behaviour, Soh had also sent the SNOC two legal letters.

In response to the letters, the SNOC had requested for more time to answer the letter sent by Soh, and also had asked for the matter to be kept private. Soh questioned why the matter must be private when SNOC is a public body, and also why they had to take so long to reply to his question on why he was excluded, given that they were the ones who had come to the decision, and the decision should be based on facts that SNOC had already possessed.

This saga is far from over. Soh's SEA Games dream though, is over before it can even begin.